Hole in Wall Heist: Raiders Loot 3,000 Safe Deposit Boxes
January 07, 26
(IDEX Online) - Thieves looted gold, diamonds, jewelry, cash and other valuables from 3,000 safe deposit boxes after drilling through the wall of a bank in Germany over the Christmas weekend.
Police called it a "spectacular," raid that was meticulously planned and which would have required insider knowledge, much like the Ocean's Eleven movie.
They estimate losses at EUR 30m ($35m), but the actual value could be far higher, as much as EUR 90m ($105m), according to some reports. That would make it one of Germany's largest ever burglaries.
It has echoes of the infamous Hatton Garden heist in 2015, when criminals drilled through 20-inch-thick reinforced concrete vault wall and stole diamonds, gold, and cash valued at up to £14m ($20m).
In the Germany raid, a gang drilled through a thick concrete wall from an adjacent parking garage and breached an underground vault at a branch of the Sparkasse bank, in Gelsenkirchen, in the west of the country.
They forced open more than 3,000 safe deposit boxes before speeding off in black Audi RS6. The breach went undetected until early Monday 29 December, when a fire alarm went off.
Distraught customers, many of Turkish or Arab heritage, gathered outside the bank, demanding access to their boxes and updates from bank staff.
Many reported having stored gold, diamonds, cash, and jewelry worth far more than the EUR 10,000 ($11,700) average insured limit per box. Some said they'd deposited valuables worth EUR 1m ($1.17m).
Pic, courtesy Gelsenkirchen Police, shows the hole that was drilled into the vault.